BREAKING NEWS… READ THIS IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT BEFORE YOU DO ANYTHING
*UPDATE: We’re relaunching the polling for the Cricket Website Awards 2009 to make sure the winners are truly reflective of what cricket fans think are the best websites out there for the following three categories – best cricket news site, best cricket blog and best cricket forum. It’s come to my attention how easy it was to game the results and vote multiple times. This was completely my fault and needed to be put right. From now on voting will start from scratch for these three categories and fans can only vote once and the results of the polls will be hidden. We apologize deeply to those website owners were ahead in the polling but we think this is the fairest thing to do (if your site is the best you’ll win anyway). So we’re going to give you an intense week to vote and announce the results in the new year*
Voting Ends: 31st December 2009 Midnight
Results Announced: 1st January 2009
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
We’ve circumnavigated the web to give you cricket fans an idea of the wealth of cricketing websites out there that you maybe haven’t discovered yet. This marks the Oscars of cricket and new media and we have nominations in a series of categories – best cricket news site, best cricket blog, best new cricket blog, best cricket forum, best cricket video site and best cricket games site.
And it’s up to you the cricket fans to adjudicate which sites are the best in their categories. We’ve got a poll for you after each category and you have up until Christmas Day to decide which sites you love best. We’ll announce the results during the Boxing Day tests.
If you think there is a website that justifies being nominated and we’ve missed it (we are human after all) then shoot an email and it just might make it into the list.
What? Cricket Website Awards 2009 (The Cricketing Oscars)
How to Vote? Simply vote below, you have until December 25th
When are the Results? During the first day of the Boxing Day Test matches around the world.
So lets get to it…
The Nominees for the Best Cricket News Site Are …
Cric InfoWhat more can you say about Cricinfo that hasn’t already been said? If you want to find any information on cricket it’s almost always the first port of call. Cricinfo claims to be the world’s leading cricket website and among the top five single-sport websites in the world.
Founded in 1993, ESPNcricinfo’s content includes news, live ball-by-ball coverage of all Test and one-day international matches and features written by some of the world’s best cricketers and cricket writers. The site also includes in-depth statistics on every one of the 3000 international and 50,000 first-class cricketers to have played the game.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
BBC Sport CricketSo cricket is going back to terrestrial television in the UK in the not so distant future. But that’s still a few years away. In the mean time the BBC does provide one of the finest cricketing websites with Test Match Special and Jonathan Agnew doing sterling work over the years.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Cricket WorldCut in a similar mould to Cricinfo, Cricket World is one of the most comprehensive cricket news sites out there on the web. Born out of the leading cricket magazine established in 1987, cricket world morphed online in 1996 and offers a whole host media and services from radio to tv, to stats to live scores to whatever you name.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Baggy GreenPart of the Nine network Baggy Green offers the latest cricket news complete with the best aussie pundits around. It’s also a great place to relive all the highlights of the Cricket Show.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
The Times CricketTraditional news media has the advantage over the little guy when it comes to raw news. But the Times is a great example of a site that’s doing it well. And Athers is a really great columnist.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
CricBuzz Blazing fast cricket scores at par with the live action, ball by ball commentary, highlights, graphics, live chats with fans, cricket news, fan blogs and photos make CricBuzz a really compelling site.
————————————————————————————————————————————————
The Nominations for the Best Cricket Blog Are …
Cricket BlogThe Cricket Blog is the lovechild of cricket tragic JC living in Brisbane. He and his team of writers bring their own unique brand of cricket writing from both an Australian and Indian perspective.According to JC he likes to get “on the sledge” in the truest of Aussie traditions.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
King Cricket King from King Cricket already has a whole host of plaudits to his name. He guest writes for Wisden and has been published on Cricinfo as well. Maybe he can add one more plaudit to the ones below…
- Recommended by the Guardian
- The Wisden Cricketer’s first ‘best of blogs’ winner
- Number four in Patrick Kidd’s ten must-read cricket websites at The Times
- Number nine in The Telegraph’s Top 20 Cricket Sites
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Harris Sports ThoughtNick Harrison, the man behind Harris Sports Thought, does not limit his sparkling wit and repartee to the cricket field covering tons of different sports. Nevertheless his musings on cricket are constantly hilarious and following him throughout the Ashes 2009 was pure shits and giggles.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Cricket With Balls“Erotic conquering for peace, with a bat” just about sums it up. The Gene Simmons of the cricket blogging community, JRod is the wordsmith cricketing rockstar who’s founded his own religion/cult called “Sehwagology”, published two books and got his own range of merchandise. His blog is extremely funny too.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
The CorridorWill Luke began The Corridor in 2004 thanks to a rant about Alec Stewart from his Dad in hospital. Penning his own thoughts online The Corridor was born. In 2005 the blog joined forces with Cricinfo and has apparently been a match made in heaven ever since. Definitely one of the best of the host of Cricinfo blogs.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Well PitchedCricket this time from a Pakistani perspective. Umair Qazi aka “Q”, Masud Mahdi aka “Sledgehammer” and Obaidullah Khawaja aka “Obaid”, a bunch of cricket fans who turned their discussions into one of the best cricket websites around, bring a compelling look at cricket around every corner.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Cricket CurrentCricket Current writes a hell of a lot and provides some of the most insightful cricket features around.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Bored Cricket Crazy Indians The darker side and funnier side of Indian cricket. Bored Cricket Crazy Indians (BCC!) has Bored Members, who meet for Bored Meetings and sing the Bored Anthem. On site are characters like Jatman (Sehwag), Che (Cheteshwar Pujara), Yawn T Roads, Bored Peon & Bored Neon; there’s the thankless ‘Thank You Sachin!’ Group and the pointless FreeSanth venture.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Poshin’s WorldCricket and humour combined in this eye catching blog. He’s one of the most passionate cricket fans out there who lives and breathes the game. His blog shows that.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
The Nominations for the Best New Cricket Blog Are …
Against the SpinThis is the number 1 place to go if you’re a big enough cricket tragic to love the most insane cricket statistics possible. This site is literally the ultimate in the physics of cricket and the outcome of potential matches. It is cricket from a statistical perspective.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Thoughts from the dustbinThe story is intriguing and the SidtheGnomenator tells it best. So here it is:
“Yes, this is a cricket blog. Why the non-cricket title? When I started out, this was meant to be a general blog with random entries consisting of random thoughts – hence, thoughts from the dustbin of my mind. As those thoughts started to gravitate from “dustbin” to screen, however, it soon became clear that a great many of my thoughts are about cricket. So, the name stayed, the URL stayed, the content got more streamlined. There you have it.”
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Pongo Cricket Talk about bursting onto the scene. They might be heavily backed by Yorkshire and a lot of famous faces but some of their blogs/columnists are absolutely great. Definitely worth a look and a vote.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Paddle Sweep“Where cricket is a stream of thought”. A relative newcomer to the cricketing blogosphere the paddle sweep kicks it with hilarity and a vigour so innovative it’s comparable to the “Dilscoop” even. Check this one out and get voting.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Test Match SofaThese guys have to be one of the funniest new arrivals into the crazy world of online cricket. It’s so much more than a blog but we don’t have a category that can describe what they’re doing. Test Match Sofa is the alternative cricket commentary with an irreverent approach that beats the pants off the BBC or your regular cricket commentary. Mute your TV and get these guys guiding you through the action.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
The Nominations for the Best Cricket Video Site …
Cricket CrowdCricket Crowd brings you a whole host of different video content. You can watch all the cricket highlights as they happen, golden moments from the past and the latest controversies in video format.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Cricket TubeThe cricketing version of youtube brings you all the highlights right after they happen and funny video clips alike.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Cricket UFeatures some of the most classic matches, innings and catches you could possibly see in cricket.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
CricHotlineIs a cricket blog that also offers links to live streaming. It’s best feature however is showing a longer form of cricket highlights than other cricket sites. So if you like to sit down and savour your highlights and miss very few balls CricHotline is the site for you.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Cricket Nirvana This is the place to go if you want to see all the Indian highlight online. It mixes it up with some really great video content and good news and features to match. They also webcast all the matches played in India live. Definitely worth a look.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Cricket Online TVWatch free online cricket highlights videos and clips, cricket players videos from Australia, India, Pakistan, England, West Indies, Sri Lanka, South Africa and much much more places. Seen by many as the pinnacle of cricket video sites.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
CricFireCricFire comes highly recommended from a number of cricket fans. It’s seen by many as the most fun place to enjoy highlights and discuss cricket.
————————————————————————————————————————————————
Cricket SafariCricket Safari has video highlights and much much more including latest scores, updates and news to cricket fans.
————————————————————————————————————————————————
The Nominations for the Best Cricket Forum …
World Cricket ForumDoes exactly what the name suggests. A great forum for cricket fans, intense on comments and spam free.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Cricket WebA really great cricket forum that’s won multiple awards. Has much much more than just forum posts with world cricket features and blogs to boot.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Big CricketFeaturing over 12,000 members Big Cricket is one of the biggest cricket forums and is growing fast.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
A fun forum more than anything else with cricket being their main dish.
Unlike many other country-specific forums, they pride themselves on being a truly global forum. You will find a separate live thread for every single Test, ODI or T20I match played, regardless of which teams are involved.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
SL Cricket Pretty self explanatory here, this one’s a cricket forum dedicated to and run by Sri Lankan cricket fans.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Pak PassionQuite simply if you want to know anything about Pakistan cricket including insights from current players and legends of the game alongside one of the biggest cricket forum communities this site is for you.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Indian Cricket Fans Pretty self explanatory here as well. This forum boasts the best in Indian cricket articles, videos and discussion. It has a community growing very fast.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Island CricketIsland Cricket most definitely takes the prize for the best looking forum. It also has bucketloads of great content with interviews, blogs, polls, its own cricket show and games. This is another great place to go for Sri Lankan cricket fans in particular.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Cricket ForumCricket forum marks another globally focused cricket forum dedicated to cricket fans. Provides the chance for cricket enthusiasts to discuss the game they love alongside articles and photo galleries.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Planet Cricket Arguably the best forum on the planet. Has a focus on international cricket and not just a specific country. Also features great articles, games and fantasy cricket.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
The Nominations for the Best Cricket Games Site …
Stick CricketProbably the godfather of online cricket games. We’ve all played it at one point and it’s pretty addictive as you’ll most definitely find out.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Cover Drive CricketA bright sunny afternoon, the sound of leather on willow, the appreciative roar of the crowd. It can only mean one thing – the game of Cricket and Cover Drive cricket at that.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
SlogoutEver dreamt of playing like your heroes do? With Just Slogout! you can. Score as many runs as humanly possible in your allotted overs. Set new records, blaze many a boundary and see your name up in the bright lights on the Just Slogout! leader board. This game comes from Cricinfo.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
CrickeesThe premier online cricket prediction game. See how you fare against other cricket tragics to demonstrate your monstrous cricketing nouse.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Dream11Dream11.com was conceptualized by a group of cricket enthusiasts with a goal to create the world’s best fantasy cricket platform, where millions of fans could not only select and manage their ‘Dream11’ but also compete and connect with the global cricket community. They offer an evolved user interface, engaging community features and to bind it all, the world’s first graphical fanta sy cricket game which we believe will revolutionize the way fantasy cricket is perceived and played globally.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Howzat This is arguably the best free online multiplayer game on the web. This one comes highly recommended by Cricket With Ball’s JRod so it’s definitely worth checking out.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Cricket Gaming.netIn just 6 months, Cricket gaming has got a lot of popularity and recognition among various game developers and cricket fans alike.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————-
There should be a category for cricket social networking websites also.
In last 2 years there has been many social sites for cricket launched.
e.g. http://www.thecricfanclub.com
http://community.t20.com/
http://www.cricket-network.net/
http://www.cricket360.com/
http://www.ocricket.com/
[Reply]
David Siddall Reply:
December 15th, 2009 at 7:41 am
Thanks for the feedback, we’ll definitely include cricket social networking sites in next year’s awards
[Reply]
Cricfire has been added along with Cricket Safari to the nominations for best cricket video site. Make sure you get voting!
[Reply]
@Bimlesh CricBuzz has been added to the nominations for best cricket news site as it offers so much.
[Reply]
Indian cricket fans is truly a great forum. The members have vast knowledge of the game and the discussions are highly intelligent.
[Reply]
ICF all the way. We’ve got the best cheerleaders around and they don’t even need pom poms! We even have an annual forum meet and I’m the current tyre throwing champ…good times.
[Reply]
Cricbuzz also offers a unique chat option where users- (“buzzers”) as they are fondly known – can interact with each other. We even have a retired umpire, an ex Ranji cricketer for a buzzer! It’s an amazing platform to make friends, learn-teach cricket, shower praises on your favorite cricketers. The ability to type a “Damn” when a wicket goes down or a “Great” to applaud a shot while watching live action is invaluable.
[Reply]
East or West
ICF is the best
Forget the rest
ICF is the best
Pakis are pest
ICF is the best
[Reply]
East or West
ICF is the best
Forget the rest
ICF is the best
[Reply]
Howzat rules!
[Reply]
Lets just give it to ICF. They are the most deserving anyway. Plus it is only fair now that India is also #1 cricket nation in the world(and rankings).
[Reply]
Howzat for the win!!
[Reply]
Funny forums you guys have nominated. Find out where the real cricket fans are. Post/thread numbers, number of members daily involvements, decency and substantial posts are next to none.
You are invited, if you want to see cricket fans.
T_E.
[Reply]
Is there any way to report inappropriate comments on the poll system you’ve used, David?
Passionate fans is one thing, racism is another. And it’s certainly not a very good advertisement for any site that is involved.
-Proud to be a member of cricforum.
[Reply]
David Siddall Reply:
December 15th, 2009 at 7:51 am
Thanks TDM,
World Cricket Watch is serious about cricket and that’s just it. So I’ve turned off the comments for the best forum category. Sorry to the people that were discussing intelligently but that’s the way we roll.
[Reply]
Voting was rigged;
:rose:
[Reply]
Hey David, its surprising to not see planetcricket.net here. They have far more traffic than all the other forums put together. Would recommend you have it included. They might just have an outside chance of winning.
[Reply]
@david
add these … I’ve already recomended them by email and through this comment form and you don’t seem to care? Should I tweet you as well? or you are just gonna ignore?
Zimbabwe Cricket Fans Forum: http://www.zimcricketforums.com
Westindies Cricket Fans Forum: http://caribbeancricket.com
Bangladesh Cricket Fans Forum: http://www.banglacricket.com/
[Reply]
Pakpassion members have no other job other than whinging about how Indians score better. Put them on the same pitch. They will get bowled out for 75 runs against the same Srilanka attack. 24/7/365 jealousy about Indian batting and bowling.
[Reply]
My only job is to be getting jealous about the batting greats of India. By the way i am from Pakpassion. I cannot admit that our batsmen are worse than their tailenders. But that is a fact. i will continue to live in denial. Our bowlers are far worse than their bowlers as their bowlers helped them take their side to no.1 spot in Tests and no.2 in ODIs.
[Reply]
@cool wind
the best forum category is now looking very crowded so will not be accepting any more nominations. Thanks for the recommendations for those really great forums.
[Reply]
I feel http://www.cricketgaming.net should also be there for their quality news and articles.
[Reply]
really good video site category like CricketU and cricketsafari.Both have good content
[Reply]
How on earth is PlanetCricket not in the Cricket Forums nominations?
[Reply]
@Zorax my apologies Zorax, as you can see I updated the awards so Planet Cricket was nominated. But i accidentally got rid of their bio and picture. It’s all corrected now.
[Reply]
nice to see cricketgaming nominated!!!
[Reply]
PakPassion just saying that I could not become a forum member. Liek any other forum, signed up, activated the account using the email, but apparently you need admin to authorise the account and it wasn’t. So please nobody tell me that sh*thole is the best forum when you can’t even sign up.
[Reply]
Best gaming site is Dream11..I can play some girl cricket games too out there…fun to play there…. I am a big fan of cricket…and I can see awesome website of cricket and games….Games are best part of it…
[Reply]
I have sent in my blog nomination.
[Reply]
i have sent in my nomination for my cricket blog.
[Reply]
Yo Indian Cricket Fans, I’m really happy for you, I’ma Let you finish, but Indian Cricket Fever has one of the best forum of all time!of all time!!
[Reply]
One has to question the validity of the results. The deletion of cookies affords the user the ability to vote with the frequency they desire!
[Reply]
it’s up to the voter. how honest he is.
[Reply]
Cricketsafari and CricFire are going neck to neck…Great fight between these to rivals
[Reply]
Whats the prize for winning award in each category..
Surely there got to be be something !!
[Reply]
Mine has the best stupid cricket limericks!
But there’s no category for that
http://www.birdfolk.co.uk/bard.html
PLEASE CHECK IT OUT!
[Reply]
@David great limericks David, I love it, might have to be included in the Friday “Christmas Day” Cricket Links, stay tuned
[Reply]
Hey, http://www.dream11.com is the best site for fantasy cricket
[Reply]
cricket safari is the best. its surely goin to win
[Reply]
You just killed all interest in your “awards”.
I can’t imagine why you would shoot yourself in the foot and re-launch voting?
IF you know anything about online polls, you then know there is absolutely no way to prevent those determined to vote multiple times. There is no way to do it. Even if you limit IP’s to one per vote, do you know how easy it is to circumvent that?
What a shame!
[Reply]
What a bunch of douches! People who voted wont be voting again. We can’t ask members and fans of our site to re-vote? How amatuer is that???
So basically those who were leading the poll with genuine votes are screwed.
Leave it to a bunch of poms to mess the whole thing up!
[Reply]
@Roger Thanks for the feedback. I think we’d be shooting ourselves in the foot a lot more to let results that are completely unfair stand and not what reflective of what the cricket community truly thinks.
[Reply]
This is quite retarded. No one’s gonna vote. This site was getting hits cuz of this thing but its over guys!!!!!!!!!!!!! Stupid!!!! GOD!!
[Reply]
@Timothy Thanks for the feedback.
If your members and readers love your site I’m sure they’d be more than happy to take a moment – it must take all of 20 seconds to vote – to tell all the other cricket fans out there how good your site is.
A better awards that are truly reflective is what’s at stake, so I don’t see the problem in that.
[Reply]
@ EVERYONE only the categories where there have been obvious signs of gaming have now been updated. All other of the nominations remain unchanged. Sorry for any confusion and thanks to everyone for their feedback about the update.
[Reply]
This re-polling seems to be unfair, in my opinion. I guess this has been done primarily to satisfy a particular website. Due to XMas and New Year Holidays, most of the fans would be away and re-polling would be extremely difficult. I am sure that the issue of multiple voting must have been aware. Looks like this whole voting pattern is primarily designed to ensure that one particular website emerges the winner always. Have fun, mate, though not sure how good this voting and results will be with regard to the world cricket fraternity.
[Reply]
Would love to see Cricketvoice in the list of nominees for best cricket forum
Cheers,
DD
[Reply]
@Vicky Thanks for the feedback. We’re glad you feel passionate about it.
We can ensure you that the polls plugged were only for the reasons stated in the update. We at World Cricket Watch don’t have any favourites in terms of particular sites.
In terms of the timing there is a heap of cricket being played over this period so I don’t think it should interrupt too much with cricket fans schedules.
Thanks once again.
[Reply]
David, Thanks for your response.
I am sure you would have anticipated multiple voting pattern. Even with the update provided, can you eradicate multiple voting as there is no id associated with a fan voting for a particular cricket website. I do appreciate the efforts for the poll but not too sure if the patterns do reflect an accurate picture.
[Reply]
Hi,
I would like to nominate my cricket webring http://cricket.siterings.net – but not sure which category would be appropriate.
We are possibly the only ‘functioning’ cricket webring on the net.
[Reply]
PlanetCricket is best Cricket forum on the internet. It has great discussions, cricket mods, fantasy leagues, general talk and its all a lot of fun. I think PlanetCricket is the outright winner
[Reply]
Guys, I think Cricket Safari has a far edge and if the polling patterns are genuine like doda, i think Cricket Safari will rock and will have the maximum voting points.
All the genuine cricket lovers will vote only CRICKET SAFARI.Its a deal.
Best wishes from the entire cricket lovers to CRICKET SAFARI.
ALAKH
Cricket Lover
[Reply]